The thumbs up and the wide smile across the Ensign’s lips was exactly what Lieutenant Zoé Moreau was hoping to see.

The twenty-something burly man, probably at his first assignment, was standing by the docking ramp that granted access to Zoé's new post: the USS London. She walked right past the young man without stopping to thank him for his help, just barely acknowledging his presence with a glance and a quick nod.

She had been pacing across the halls of Spacedock since zero six hundred hours, refusing to come aboard before the Commanding Officer would have done so. Upon spotting Zoé walking back and forth as if she was a restless soul, the Ensign had promptly offered to assist her. After receiving such a courteous invitation, Zoé had instructed the man to discretely inform her when the London's Commanding Officer would have boarded the starship. Now it was late afternoon and, apparently, the man had finally shown up.

A single deep breath was all that Zoé allowed to herself as she made her entrance into what would have been her new home for who knew how long. She had already committed to memory all specifications and every little detail concerning the ship, thus she didn't hesitate for a moment when she reached her personal quarters on Deck Two, the usual blank expression covering her face while she walked with a self-assured gait, ignoring those who happened to cross her path in those minutes.

Her quarters turned out to be cozier than expected. On her previous assignment, the Excelsior-class USS Fredrickson, her room had been more spartan and certainly less spacious. Most of her personal effects had already arrived and had been left on the floor in a way that would have made it easier for her to organize the cabin as she wanted it. The hint of a smile appeared on her lips, her cerulean eyes slowly sliding from one side of the room to the other.

Better get started, she thought. The cabin would have been her sanctuary, the place where she would have spent most of her time in solitude. She had always been a lone-she-wolf, eve during her puberty, when most boys and girls alike usually gave their parents plenty of troubles. Not Zoé Moreau, though. She had studied and then studied some more, her mind never drifting towards frivolous notions, her desire to experience the vastness of space stronger and stronger in the very core of her being as the years went by. Until she had attended Starfleet Academy, infuriating her rich father, but transmuting that dream of seeing space into a reality she had so desperately wanted.

Now she was fully in charge of her destiny and nothing pleased her more. As she began unpacking her belongings, neatly arranging them around the cabin, she wondered about the rest of the Senior Officers that now served aboard the London. Things had to change and she knew it. If she wanted to further her career and achieve her goals, then she had to find a way to step up and be more social, become more of an example that men and women would have gladly followed. The only way to do that was to inspire people and show her leadership qualities in a manner that didn't come across as the ruthless, unapologetic taskmistress she had been known to be, most of the times.

She stood rooted in place before her bed as she pondered on her future, an old book about the ancient Sumerians clutched in her hands; a gift from her father. She sighed and pouted, if only for a moment. After so many years of being who she had always been, she had no idea of how she was supposed to reinvent herself.

Perhaps time was all that she needed, and only time itself would have provided a definitive answer.